Monday, August 1, 2011

Another Hike (Timp) and July Totals

On a few other blogs, I noticed that others post their monthly totals. It got me curious on what I have done in July.

July Totals
Running - 92 Miles
Hiking - 26.5 miles

Not too bad! I have been putting in some long runs the past few weeks as I am training for a half marathon on August 20th. On my long run Saturday, I was pleasantly surprised by how many of my neighbors I saw that were out running and biking. Todd, Matt, Wayne, Nevin and Kevin to name a few. This was at a place on the trail that was pretty far out so I know they were all doing some serious miles. Always fun to see someone you know! I also saw David out this morning as well.

Timp Hike

My brother Gordon invited me to hike Timp with him last Thursday. I have previously written about how much snow we got over the spring and it is still affecting hiking in any of the high altitudes. Timp is no exception. I hiked it twice last year and there wasn't any snow at all. This year, we started running into snow three miles up and got stopped at 5. We weren't overly surprised since we looked around online and also made a call to the ranger station. They said not to many people were making it up too Emerald Lake. A picture online showed that a rather large emergency shelter was still half buried in snow as of mid-July. I remember eating my lunch there last year the first time I went up.

Still we were not disappointed. The snow melt that is still going on made the waterfalls plentiful and beautiful! The hike was absolutely gorgeous!

Plenty of water

Scout Falls

This is where we decided to turn back. We had already crossed several snow fields. This one was steep and dropped down several hundred feet. We weren't equipped to get across. Gordon started over but said it was pretty shaky.

Another view of the falls. Beautiful! Worth the hike just to see all the waterfalls!

Another snow field. This is on July 28th!

We slid down one of the snowfields on the way back down. It was pretty fun to do it on purpose.

Heading out to King's Peak this week. Still a little questionable, but there have been reports that people have gone and made it to the top. I told Gordon that even if we don't make it this year, it will be a good practice run for next year. If we do make it, that will complete my Three Peak Challenge.

Wow, this is gorgeous! And I'm glad you had the sense to know where to stop. I hear stories all the time in Washington of people who press their luck too far. Discretion...valor...you get it. Anyway, great totals. Have a great August!